Don't Judge
Read John 5:22-30 The Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son, that all may honor the Son, even as they honor the Father. He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him. Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears my word and believes him who sent me, has eternal life; he does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life. John 5:22-24
Right Judgment is essentially about not being swayed, nor swaying others. In Right Judgment our decisions are not overly influenced by the past. Right Judgment also is also balanced by thinking and intention. When we judge someone we place them under the compulsion of our ego. From the perspective of our I AM we usually do not judge for we know that we don’t have all the facts. We also know that karma is the great adjuster. Rather than judge, we simply observe of the behaviour of the other person and seek to understand.
The great example of this is the story of Mary Magdalene caught in adultery. Afterwards Jesus spoke these words: You judge according to the flesh, I judge no one. Yet even if I do judge, my judgment is true, for it is not I alone that judge, but I and he who sent me. John 8:15-16
The Greek word for ‘judgment’ is krisis which speaks of a separating, then a decision. Pulling an issue apart and putting it back together again so that it is understood as fully as possible. Judgment as we experience it today is often hasty and often deadly. If we leave ourselves open to believe, Christ says, we do not come into judgment, but pass from death to life.
Of all things, judgment is our area of greatest difficulty. How can we decide what is true and what is false, what is good and what it bad? Judgment is inflicted on us from every side of life. Do this and don’t do that … songs were written about in the sixties. Who decides what is right and what is wrong? Government? Church? Parents? Friends? Most of the time they ‘say’ what is right and ‘do’ the wrong. Henry Thoreau, the 19th century philosopher said, “The greater part of what my neighbours call good I believe in my soul to be bad …”. Nothing much has changed.
Judgment is not about taking one position or another, judgment is about a continual weighing up; visiting both sides of the scale, not weighting one side. When both sides of the scale are balanced, then judging can occur. But what is this judging really?
In this material, earthly existence everything we face in life can equally be proved as right or it can be contradicted as wrong. We must let the pros AND the cons merge in our soul equally, not one outweighing the other. Compare it to breathing in and breathing out – both must be equal, if we breathe in more than we breathe out it could lead to an explosion.
Our modern understanding of judgment is that it is once and for all. But judgment is a very mobile activity; it is a continual process of discerning. Furthermore, we cannot judge from where we stand, we must actively move forward into a new position and carry out the activity of judging there. This requires a certain amount of strength and courage. We always feel much more stable staying where we are which makes it very difficult to separate out all the facts and put them together differently. Then we do not pass from death to life.
Rudolf Steiner gives these guidelines for judging that lead to good decision making.
Upon examination it is surprising to see how much of our judging stems from the subconscious memories from past lives. If we encounter someone who in a past life decapitated us it is hard not to treat them accordingly. The memory of it is etched into our being; we may still carry the evidence of it in our body. Red welts can appear on the neck of a person who is re-experiencing having their throat slit. This is our karma which we have to balance. The only thing to do is to hear the words of Christ and know that if we do not judge according to the flesh then we will not be judged and we will pass from death to life now.
Judgement and Decision
Hi Kristina,
Thank you for this - the exercise from Steiner seems very good and I will try it.
I notice from my work that people are constantly pressed for decisions in the moment - when will this be ready, who is responsible for this, is this possible and so on. Many times even on a purely rational level the response is inappropriate and later events prove this.
With important decisions sometimes a different procedure is followed, e.g. brainstorming and so on. This means that at least some of the steps Steiner recommends are followed, e.g. taking a bit longer, visualising alternatives etc. But this would only usually be when the situation does not suggest a few obvious alternatives and/or there is little pressure for an immediate decision.
Because of the time pressure people are often pressed into hasty decisions - certainly Steiner recommended developing presence of mind which can be useful in such situations, but I guess it is a matter of discerning when decisive action is required and when taking a longer time is more appropriate.
Doing Nothing
Hi Tim,
You've highlighted an important dilemma for us all. We all seem to be obsessed with problem solving almost as if it were an adiction. I don't know whether it's like this in your antipodial clime but here the shops are continuously changeing their layout so that one is disorientated continuously; it is as if we are pressed to continuously solve problems that might not need to be 'solved' in this way.
I can remember after the attack on the Twin Towers there was an eerie three week or so silence while America considered its response. It was as if the silence and non response was the most powerful thing. I even heard reports that because nothing 'predictable' was happening the Taliban didn't quite know what to do next and became unsure of themselves.
I once saw a book that was designed for primary school kids(6 thru 11) to encourage them to be still and not afraid of quiet. The title was a witty reversal of a well known phrase: 'Don't just do something, sit there!'
Of course, as you say, that is not always appropriate but who knows, not doing the predicatable thing might be more radical and problem solveing than we think.
judgment and blame
Hello Kristina , my Sorrore in Spirit
I was delighted to read your entry, it is synchronistic and truly a meaningful coincidence to discover you here on the net, when only very recently i recieved some information about your recent book.
I believe that judgment as a weapon of the ego accompanies blame. These are the two main tools of the ego. The ego judges and blames constantly to make itself right and the other wrong. Blame and judgment also releases the ego from any responsibility i.e 'the ability to respond' appropriately. True responsibility must come from the I Am, and it often requires courage to ask yourself, 'how do I take responsibility' in any given situation. It is usually so much easier and cowardly to judge and blame and accept no responsibility. We do it constantly, judging and blaming the government, or George Bush or Osama Bin Laden or the Christian right or big corporations or our parents etc. And when two egos meet and they both blame and judge each other, neither accepting responsibility we have the old karmic merry-go-round. To step off that merry-go-round requires grace, requires love,requires forgiveness and requires the acceptance of response-ability. The 7 steps for good decision making you explained sounds like a good formula for accepting responsibility and then resoponding ably and appropriately.
may God bless you real good.
Resposibility
Hi Kenneth,
I think you have put it very well. We can see how we live in a world where there is a constant process of projection outward. We often find it in ourselves which is painful especially those of us (me!) who like to think they have gone into these issues.
The Gospel Parable of the Mote and Beam is a remarkable example of the change of consciousness being potentially offered to us. The hero of Tolstoy's 'Ressurection' struggles with this and says at one point: 'If only we could see the beam in our own eye in time, how kind we would be to one another.' I think the operative expression here is 'in time'. Habitual thinking does not give us the 'time' to see what we are doing as we become unfree 'mechanisms' and, to some extent, lose part of our full humanity.
The desire for psychological security is so great that we find it hard to bear the call to freedom. In the 1918 introduction to Philosophy of Freedom Steiner makes it clear that freedom cannot be based on 'principles' we store in our memory but must be addressed afresh as we confront life. We seem to want a resting plase where we can say 'now I understand now I've found it, I can rest on these laurels'.
Why do we want ease and security so much when it deprives us of the very seed of life? Bush wants the security of his 'truth', the suicide bomber his or hers each feeding the other. The devil certainly 'plays the best tunes' here!
Good comments
Tim, Kenneth and Simon,
Thank you for adding to the ideas I gathered together in response to Buddha's judgement path. I always hope to leave enough space around my ideas for other/new thoughts. Simon sums it up when he says "Why do we want ease and security so much when it deprives us of the very seed of life?" Kenneth (hello my fratre) so rightly points out the very core of Steiner's purpose; that we understand that every transaction in our life is karmic. And Tim, I wonder if the pressure we feel to make decisions / judge is not actually misplaced ... could this experience of pressure actually be the pressure of our higher self wanting to have a say in things. But Lucifer 'Mr Instant' presses our astral to seek satisfaction / resolution through quick decision making. Oh, deep thought worth sleeping on :)
Negative Capability
It's that Negative Capability thing again. (Ketas etc) How much unknowing, unresolution, unclarity can you hold without doing anything? Because in some funny way the more you hold it, the more space is created for knowing, resolution, clarity and creativity. But you don't know when...
I suspect that, like many things, once one develops this capability one finds situations that really press seem occur less and less often - its as if one has built the spiritual muscles necessary to hold the un... Mind you, the challenges seem to get bigger all the time!
Seeing Both Sides
Hi Kristen,
As I work my way slowly through the essays you've written here, I find a lot to think about with each one. One of the things that has struck me most this time around studying PoF is the idea of keeping opposites together in a kind of creative tension. Whether it's subject/object, duality/unity, or right/wrong as you mention here. I've truly found that "everything we face in life can equally be proved as right or it can be contradicted as wrong," and this has been a source of confusion all my life! Because if you can see both sides of what you're about to do, it takes the wind out of your sails. I suppose that's why the only solution to the dilemma is the one Steiner proposes in PoF: to do something because you love the idea of doing it.